


Collide

by eerian_sadow



Category: Transformers - All Media Types, Transformers Generation One
Genre: Community: tf_rare_pairing, Fluff, Kissing, M/M, Serious Injuries, injuries, mech smoochies, wheeljack is a self-sacrificing idiot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-07-15
Updated: 2010-07-15
Packaged: 2018-05-17 01:42:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,011
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5849074
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eerian_sadow/pseuds/eerian_sadow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Wheeljack and Mirage find themselves in a tight place after a Decepticon booby trap.</p>
            </blockquote>





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**Author's Note:**

> written for the weekly requests at [](http://tf-rare-pairing.livejournal.com/profile)[tf_rare_pairing](http://tf-rare-pairing.livejournal.com/) for the prompt: wheeljack/mirage - "we can get through this"
> 
> Thanks to [](http://wicked3659.livejournal.com/profile)[**wicked3659**](http://wicked3659.livejournal.com/) for the beta. ^_^

[ ](http://pics.livejournal.com/eerian_sadow/pic/000q454h/)

It was dark. And tight. And he couldn’t move.

It was that last that sent him into near-panic. He didn’t even realize he was screaming, until his surroundings were lit up with gentle blue light and someone was shushing him.

“Take it easy, Mirage,” Wheeljack said softly. “I’ll have you out in a minute. You’re okay.”

“Wheeljack?” The spy’s vents were still cycling air too quickly and his cooling fans were still running far too heavily, but the inventor’s voice helped calm the initial panic. There had been no soft blue lights or gentle voices when he woke in the ruins of the Towers. “What happened?”

The comforting blue light moved away as Wheeljack returned to the process of removing whatever was pinning him to the ground. “The Decepticons booby trapped the entrance to the _Ark_. You, Blaster and I were the boobies.”

“Blaster? Is he…?” Despite his own situation, Mirage felt a spike of worry for the communications specialist.

“Don’t know. I haven’t found him yet.” There was a flare of light from somewhere near his feet as Wheeljack activated a cutting torch. “And my comms are out. Yours?”

Mirage ran a systems check. “Offline as well. Jamming, perhaps? I’m not registering any damage.”

“Don’t know. Parts of my comm are on the ground to your left.” Wheeljack tried to keep his tone light, but the noble could hear an undercurrent of worry and fear. “All right, I think I’ve got enough of this moved that we can shift it off you. I’ll lift and you scoot.”

“All right. I’m ready when you are.” He wasn’t entirely sure he was actually ready, as he hadn’t fully assessed all his damage, but he did desperately want to be out from underneath the debris pinning him down.

“On three then. One, two, _three_!” Wheeljack heaved and the metal shrieked as it bent and tore.

Mirage didn’t give himself time to analyze it; he just slid to the side as quickly as he could. “I’m clear, Wheeljack.”

The engineer dropped the metal as Mirage turned on his headlights to illuminate the cavern that had formed around them. He gasped as Wheeljack dropped the metal that had been pinning him and collapsed on top of it.

“Wheeljack!” He moved to the other mech’s side immediately. He frowned when he lifted the engineer and saw energon running down his chest plating. “Primus. You did that damaged like this?”

“Wasn’t this bad before,” Wheeljack gasped out. “Tore something else when I lifted the door.”

Mirage’s frown deepened. If he’d been trapped beneath one of the blast doors that sealed the entrance to the _Ark_ that explained why he hadn’t been able to move, but one mech should never have tried to lift it on his own. “Wheeljack, you should have left me under there rather than damaging yourself further.”

“I couldn’t.” The engineer shook his head. “I remembered what it was like when we pulled you out of the Towers. Couldn’t let you go through that again.

The spy was touched. He hadn’t even known Wheeljack had been a part of his rescue party back then, but clearly the other mech hadn’t forgotten. “You still shouldn’t have damaged yourself further like that. Just having you here would have been enough to prevent the panic attack.”

“Still couldn’t have left you.” The engineer reached up with an unsteady hand and cupped Mirage’s faceplates. “You are okay, right?”

Mirage decided not to mention the damage reports he was receiving regarding the state of his spoiler, his tie rods or his bent tire rims. “I’m all right. I’m far more concerned for you.

Wheeljack dropped his hand from the noble’s face and rested it on his chest plates. “Can’t get a clear damage report. I’m not sure what’s wrong.”

For the first time, Mirage lamented the fact that he knew nothing about repairs except for very basic first aid. “What can I do to help?”

“Do you have a first aid kit?” Wheeljack’s optics were dimming almost as quickly as the energon was dripping from his chest plates.

“Yes. Jazz makes all of us carry one.” Mirage was reaching into his subspace for it before Wheeljack could even continue his instructions.

“Good.” Slowly—too slowly for them not to be damaged as well—the engineer opened his chest plates. Energon that had been pooling behind them rushed out, painting Wheeljack’s abdominal plating and Mirage’s legs a sickly pink as it oxidized. “There should be clips in there that you can use to clamp off the broken lines.”

“And what happens if I send you into stasis lock by depriving you of energon to your processor?” He had no idea how to handle that if it happened.

“It’s better than the alternative,” the other mech replied. “You can back up my memory files if it will make you feel better.”

Mirage froze at Wheeljack’s words. Letting someone into your processor like that was either suicide or an incredible act of trust.

“Gonna have to decide quick,” the engineer said softly. “My fuel levels are at forty percent and falling fast.”

That jolted the spy into action. He laid the other mech out on the floor and began checking the tubing in his chest cavity for the damaged lines. “We can worry about that when you’re not bleeding out anymore.”

-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-

Thirteen clips later, Wheeljack’s energon levels stopped falling at twenty percent. Mirage sincerely hoped that there was a rescue team on the way, because twenty percent would not see him through the rest of the day. He was also concerned about the engineer laying on the dirty floor of the cavern with his chest plates spread open; the was no way to prevent any sort of particulate matter from falling into his compromised systems in their current situation.

“Don’t look so worried,” Wheeljack said softly. His vocal indicators weren’t flashing anymore as the engineer’s body attempted to conserve what energy it still had. “You know Ratch and Jazz won’t leave us in here.”

“I’m worried about you not making it long enough to be proven right about that.” Mirage saw no reason to lie; Wheeljack knew exactly how bad his damage was.

The plating around the engineer’s optics folded in a way that suggested the other mech was grinning under his mask. “Good thing one of us is an optimist.”

“How can you expect me to be optimistic when you’re only still online through some sort of miracle? If you hadn’t been able to talk me through that, you would have gone offline and all I could have done was watch.” The spy felt ill just thinking about it.

“Hey…” Wheeljack stretched a hand out and touched Mirage’s knee joint tentatively. “Mirage, you did great. And we are going to get out of here.”

The noble shuttered his optics with a feeling that was very close to shame. Wheeljack was the one with his energon and coolant pooled and clotting on the floor of the cavern and still he was reaching out to comfort Mirage. It made him feel… less somehow. Injured and dying, Wheeljack had done nothing but think of Mirage’s well being and the spy had paid him back with pessimism and worry.

“I’m sorry,” Mirage said, ignoring Wheeljack’s hand and standing up. “You went far out of your way to take care of me and all I’ve done is sit and fret. I should be focusing on trying to get us out of here, not waiting for someone to rescue us like we’re a pair of helpless sparklings.”

“Waiting to be rescued might not be a bad idea, Raj. I’m not even sure where the _Ark_ is in relation to us anymore.” The inventor’s hand fell limply to the ground and he made no attempt to move it closer to his body. “At least one of us needs to be running decently when we get out of here, you know.”

“I know. But your chances of survival go up if I can open a path for the rescue crew.” The spy made his way to the closest wall of their cavern. Carefully, he ran his scanners over every centimeter of it, looking for any sort of opening or hollow behind it that might indicate a hallway or the outdoors. His scans returned nothing but solid rock for meters. He moved all the way around the cavern with the same results.

Defeated, Mirage dropped back down next to Wheeljack. Absently, he picked up the other mech’s hand and squeezed it tightly. “I’m sorry, Wheeljack. Either my sensors are damaged or we’re far more buried than seems reasonable.”

“Hey, don’t take it so hard.” The engineer’s voice was even softer than it had been, a sure sign of critical energy levels. “At least you tried.”

“It wasn’t enough,” the noble said softly. “It wasn’t _enough_.”

-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-

“Raj?”

Mirage’s head jerked up in surprise. Wheeljack had stopped talking hours ago to conserve energy and the spy had thought the engineer was in stasis. “Yes, Wheeljack?”

“I’ve been wondering something, for a while now, and if I don’t ask now I might not get the chance again.” The inventor shifted with a pained his, angling himself so that he could see the noble’s face more clearly. “What do you think of me? Base rumors notwithstanding.”

“I think you are a talented individual,” Mirage replied. “You are witty, kind and deeply caring toward everyone around you.”

“But do you like me?”

“I don’t dislike you.” The spy’s lip components turned down in a thoughtful frown. “I can’t say I’ve had the opportunity to get to know you well enough to say if I like you or not.”

That they might not have the chance after this went unsaid.

“Okay.” Wheeljack’s tone was dispirited, a drastic change from the eternal optimist Mirage had been trapped in this unnatural cavern with. The inventor turned away with a soft, disappointed sigh.

“What is it?” Mirage asked. “You’re too disappointed not to have wanted a different answer.”

“It’s stupid,” the engineer said. “And I was an idiot to have hoped for it.”

“After spending twenty six hours trapped in this cave—two of those playing that ridiculous Truth or Dare game you came up with—do you really think you can’t trust me with this?” The noble reached out and turned Wheeljack’s face back toward him. “Please tell me.”

“I just…” Wheeljack shuttered his optics, obviously trying to give himself some sort of mental strength. “I was hoping you would like me enough that I could ask to kiss you.”

“Is that all?” That Wheeljack wanted to kiss him wasn’t terribly surprising; Mirage had known many mechs who had wanted much more than that, based on his status alone. Wheeljack’s desire to be liked first was sweetly endearing, though. It wouldn’t be a terrible thing, to kiss the inventor—he was kind and caring after all—and it was a simple enough token to give to fulfill a dying mech’s wish. “Then why don’t you ask?”

“Because I’m not in good enough repair to take the rejection.” The engineer’s reply was quick and obviously an immediate reaction. A moment later, he fully processed the spy’s words and unshuttered his optics to look at the blue mech in shock. “Wait, what? You mean you would?”

“Yes.” Surprisingly, all the reasons he had just justified to himself meant nothing. He _wanted_ to kiss Wheeljack—not out of pity or gratitude or just to fill his last wish, but because there was such beauty in the open honesty of the mech’s expression.

“Thank you.” Wheeljack shuttered his optics again and retracted his face mask.

Mirage hadn’t quite known what to expect under Wheeljack’s mask—the base rumors said anything from the most beautiful mech in existence to the most deformed mech in existence—but he knew he hadn’t been expecting what he saw at all. The engineer was actually a rather plain mech. He was obviously well crafted—or perhaps just well repaired, knowing Ratchet—but his features were the kind that were easy to overlook. It was a rather nice change from the mass of faces among their crewmates that demanded to be looked at for one reason or another. After taking a moment to admire the other mech’s face, Mirage bent down and pressed his lip components to Wheeljack’s.

It wasn’t much as far as kisses went. Just simple movements of lip component against lip component in a gentle massage; Wheeljack didn’t have the energy to expend on anything else. It was possibly the best kiss Mirage had ever had.

The spy smiled when he pulled back. “We’ll have to do that again, once Ratchet has you repaired.”

Wheeljack returned the smile weakly. “Yeah. I’d like that.”

Mirage wanted to assure the engineer that he would like that as well, but he was stopped by a blast of static over his comm system. A moment later, he heard Jazz’s voice—crackling with interference but most definitely Jazz—over the Spec Ops frequency.

_“Slaggit, Blaster, I thought this line was cleared!”_

_”It was, Jazz! It’s not my fault he’s got Buzzsaw up in the volcano with another jammer!”_ Blaster’s reply sounded as angry and frustrated as the initial transmission from Jazz. _”I think I got it now, though.”_

 _”Jazz, I can hear you,”_ Mirage interrupted, unwilling to wait for his commander and the communication specialist to finish yelling at each other. _”I’m here with Wheeljack.”_

 _”Mirage!”_ Blaster’s voice was exuberant. _”Glad you’re still with us. I was ready to panic when I realized I was clear and you two weren’t.”_

 _”Clear. The. Line. Blaster.”_ Jazz growled. _”Raj, activate your homing beacon so we can get a fix on you. We have a good idea of where you are, but not a definite fix. And the doc is demanding a status report.”_

 _”Of course Jazz.”_ Mirage activated his homing beacon, wondering why he hadn’t remembered it sooner. Then he turned to Wheeljack to give him the good news.

The engineer was utterly still on the ground, optics offline. All of the spy’s happiness bled away when he realized the other mech had fallen into stasis.

 _”You had better hurry, Jazz,_ Mirage told him. _”Wheeljack has gone into stasis lock._

-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-

Ratchet had been livid at the state of Wheeljack’s internals when the Autobots finally pulled the two of them out of the cavern. Not at Mirage’s handling of them—he’d complemented the spy quite loudly, actually—but at the fact that Wheeljack had done a tremendous amount of the damage digging himself and Mirage out from under the debris. The spy was rather glad the engineer’s damage required Ratchet’s expertise, leaving him in the hands of First Aid; having that much anger taken out on him would not have been an enjoyable experience.

First Aid had been remarkably gentle during the repairs. Mirage had actually managed to fall into recharge while the younger medic worked, and woke feeling much more like himself.

Wheeljack was lying on the medical berth next to his. The engineer looked like he was in recharge, with a small smile on his lip components and an energon drip in his arm. Mirage allowed himself a relieved smile at the fact that the other mech was still online.

“I just about had a meltdown when First Aid told me you had processor damage,” Ratchet said, coming into his line of sight. “What were you thinking, leaving that out of your status report?”

Processor damage? Well, that explained why he hadn’t thought to activate his homing beacon—and why undamaged sensors would be returning identical scan results. “I’m sorry. I didn’t realize that I did.”

“You’re lucky it wasn’t more serious than it was. You were practically at ground zero for the avalanche after the bomb blew.” Ratchet sighed and shook his head. “You Ops mechs are all tougher than you have a right to be.”

“I feel more fortunate that Wheeljack didn’t bleed out while we were waiting to be rescued,” Mirage replied truthfully. “Even with limited processor capacity, I was in far better condition than he was.”

“Well, you’re both here and you’re both lucky to be alive.” The medic sighed again. “Thanks for that. Would have lost my best friend today if not for you.”

“You’re welcome.” Mirage gave the medic a smile.

-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-

He was reading a bookfile when Wheeljack finally came back online. The engineer blinked his optic shutters a few times as he looked around the room in confusion.

“Am I dreaming?”

“No,” Mirage replied with a grin. “We really are in Ratchet’s medbay.”

“Oh. They did find us, then?” Wheeljack’s slowly spreading smile turned into a sudden look of horror. “Did… did I really ask you to kiss me?”

“You did.” The spy’s grin didn’t waver.

“Oh, Primus.” The engineer buried his face in his hands in embarrassment. “I’m so sorry.”

“Don’t be. I rather enjoyed it.”

“Wait, what?” Wheeljack looked up at his in surprise. “You don’t hate me or think I’m shallow or want to have nothing else to do with me?”

“No.” Mirage climbed off his berth and approached the inventor’s. “I think you’re sweet and caring, even if it nearly got you killed in there. And I cannot wait to get to know you better.”

“Really?” The other mech looked skeptical as the noble approached. “You’re not just saying that because you feel sorry for me, right?”

“Absolutely not.” He reached out and took one of Wheeljack’s hands in his. “In fact, I believe I owe you something.”

Wheeljack looked puzzled at the spy’s words. “You don’t owe me anything. I didn’t do anything tha—“

Mirage cut him off with a kiss. The engineer made a soft, surprised noise when their lip components met but didn’t fight.

“Oh, that,” Wheeljack said softly when they broke apart. “Forgot all about that.”

The noble smiled gently at him. “I didn’t. I could definitely get used to kissing you.”

“Oh, please do,” the inventor replied, pulling him down again.  



End file.
